Drive on Cheats

To the Federal Trade Commission, too many U.S. businessmen fail to draw a line between legitimate puffing to make a sale and illegal lying about their product to deceive the customer. On the theory that informed and skeptical consumers are the first line of defense against the cheats, the commission last week held its first Washington Conference on Public Deception, attended by representatives of 47 civic, professional and business organizations. FTC Chairman Earl W. Kintner said the commission would go all out to open its voluminous files on "trickery in the marketplace" to public view. "In the blunt language of the street," he said, "the gyp seller depends on the sucker buyer and can't exist without him."

From the remarks of the conference speakers, there are still many sucker buyers to make life easy and profitable for gyp sellers. The outstanding forms of pocketbook piracy are still 1) "bait-and-switch advertising," i.e., luring the customer into the store with a ridiculously underpriced item, then persuading him to change to an expensive one; 2) high, fictitious list prices that are tagged on merchandise to make a customer think he is getting a bargain by a "price cut."

Threatening to outdo all the older forms of cheating-is the dishonest television commercial. Most admen are well aware of deceptions such as:

P: Sticking food particles to a plate before putting it in a dishpan to demonstrate the inferiority of a competitor's detergent.

P: Lacing breakfast cereal with ice cream so that child models will smile with delight at being served the advertiser's particular brand.

P: Saturating a sponge with a powerful bleach to prove how one cleanser leaves a stained sink sparkling white, while competing brands leave black smudges.

P: Filling a coffee pot with hot wine because real coffee tends to photograph like crankcase sludge.

P: Icing a bake-it-yourself cake with shaving cream because real icing melts under hot floodlights.

While FTC thinks it is up to the consumer himself to be on guard against deceptions, it does not believe that the consumer can do the whole job. The Bureau of the Budget has approved an increase in FTC's 1961 budget to permit it to beef up its present staff of 740, step up prosecutions and enforcement work.

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